Rose Kennedy’s tea parties and her sons’ campaigns

Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. lost the 1952 Senate race to John F. Kennedy, and he blamed the tea parties. Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, her daughters and a cousin-in-law had hosted 33 of them for around 70,000 guests, nearly all women. The National Park Service’s account of her life, from the John Fitzgerald Kennedy National Historic Site, follows her from Boston politics to the White House years.

Rose Fitzgerald on the deck of the S.S. Cymric, about 1908 to 1909. Image from NPS’s page.

Early life

Rose was born on July 22, 1890, to John and Mary Josephine Fitzgerald. Her father, the first American-born Irish mayor of Boston according to the page, took her to his rallies, where she played piano while he sang old Irish tunes, and he taught her the first lessons in politics she later passed on to her children. She loved history, languages and music. Wellesley College accepted her, but her father disliked a Protestant school, so she studied at Blumenthal, a convent boarding school in the Netherlands. Back in Boston she travelled with him around the city and abroad.

Marriage and nine children

She met Joseph Kennedy at Old Orchard Beach at seventeen. Her father thought her too young, so they met in secret until Joe, after Harvard, saved a local bank from failure and was named the country’s youngest bank president. They married on October 7, 1914, after seven years of courting, and moved to 83 Beals Street in Brookline, Massachusetts.

Left to right: John, Joe Jr., Joe Sr., Rosemary, Rose, Eunice and Kathleen Kennedy, c. 1922-23. Photographer’s marking: “Marceau, 160 Tremont Street, Boston.” NPS/Museum Collection (JOFI 24).

Rose had gone from “the belle of Boston Irish society” to a housewife and mother, and she put her energy into raising the children. They came in this order:

• Joseph Jr. in 1915, then John (Jack), Rosemary and Kathleen (Kick). By 1920 she had four children under five, and the family moved to a larger Brookline house.
• Eunice, Patricia and Robert (Bobby) were born there.
• In 1927 Joe moved the family to Bronxville, New York, a big change for a native Bostonian, where Jean and Edward (Ted) were born.

London

In 1938 President Franklin D. Roosevelt named Joseph Kennedy Ambassador to Great Britain. Rose later counted the London years among her best. She dined with the Queen, presented Rosemary and Kathleen at Court, and advised the State Department on whether hot dogs were appropriate at a picnic for the King and Queen. In 1939 the family had a private audience with Pope Pius XII, and the Pope later named Rose a Papal Countess for her motherhood and charitable work, making her only the sixth woman from the United States to hold the title. Joe resigned on November 6, 1940, with the war looming and his views differing from Roosevelt’s. Joe Jr. was killed in action on August 12, 1944.

On the campaign trail

• 1946. When Jack ran for Congress, she used her Boston connections and spoke at rallies about her years in Europe and raising nine children. Ted said she knew what each audience would care about.
• 1952. For Jack’s Senate run she hosted the “Kennedy Teas.” Jack won by 70,737 votes.
• 1960. In the presidential race she visited 14 states and made 46 appearances, and wrote hundreds of notes to Jack on his speaking style, manners and clothes, including a reminder to check his socks for holes. Jack was elected on November 8, 1960.
• Ted’s Senate run in 1962 and Bobby’s in 1964. She helped with Ted’s Senate run and Bobby’s, and hosted television specials such as Coffee with the Kennedys, which reached women across the country with tours of her Hyannis Port home.
• Bobby’s presidential run. At 77 she coached her nervous son on public speaking and kept travelling to rallies.

Rose Kennedy stands with President Kennedy to greet arriving dignitaries from Ecuador, Washington National Airport, July 23, 1962. Robert Knudsen, White House Photographs, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston.

Later years

After the deaths of her children Joe, Kathleen, Jack and Bobby, and Rosemary’s institutionalisation, she leaned on her faith. Her husband had a stroke in 1961 and died by the end of the decade. She rarely spoke of her grief and filled her time with charitable work, especially the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation, which works for people with intellectual disabilities. At a time when such disabilities were largely hidden, she spoke about them on television and at events across the country. She lived to 104. At her 100th birthday, Ted called her the quiet at the center of the family’s chaos.

Rose and Joe Kennedy with grandchildren for Joe Sr.’s 75th birthday, Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, September 7, 1963. Cecil Stoughton, White House Photographs, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston.

Sources

• National Park Service, John Fitzgerald Kennedy National Historic Site, Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy: A Life to Remember; rewritten in hubnx's own words.